For the second straight year, the Florida State League champion resides in Palm Beach County.
The Palm Beach Cardinals captured their third FSL title near midnight Wednesday, beating the Lakeland Flying Tigers 6-4, winning the championship series 2-1 in a rain-delayed contest at Jupiter’s Roger Dean Chevrolet Stadium .
The three-hour rain delay started in the bottom of the first inning. The game didn’t resume until 9:30 p.m. The Cardinals, who won the first-half and second-half titles, won the championship a year after their co-tenants, the Jupiter Hammerheads (Miami Marlins Single A affiliate) won their first-ever FSL crown.
“Never had a season like this,” Palm Beach manager Gary Kendall said. “It was almost wire to wire. Maybe we were in second place for a day or two here and there.”
Fittingly, the main hero was J.J. Wetherholt, the Cardinals’ 2024 first-round pick, who smacked a two-run triple in the seventh inning to extend a 4-3 lead to 6-3.